Ipswich Town and Norwich City are facing one similar issue right now | OneFootball

Both George Hirst and Josh Sargent are misfiring for Ipswich Town and Norwich City this season

East Anglian rivals Ipswich Town and Norwich City find themselves at two very different ends of the table, yet both face the same issue in the final third of the pitch.

It has not quite been the season that either Ipswich Town or Norwich City fans would have hoped for.

The Tractor Boys find themselves in a battle for the play-offs. Though having been relegated from the Premier League last season and having invested heavily in the squad during the summer, expectations were high for the Suffolk-based side.

Kieran McKenna has yet to get his side fully into gear this campaign, having led the club to back-to-back promotions in his first two full seasons in charge of the club, and even though they were comfortably relegated last season, the Northern Irishman's position never seemed under threat.

Their underwhelming season will be made slightly better by looking on at bitter rivals Norwich's woes, with the Canaries occupying one of the three relegation places at this stage.

Philippe Clement, who had previously managed both Monaco and Rangers, was brought in to replace Liam Manning, with the former Bristol City coach becoming statistically one of the club's worst managers in its history, having been dismissed after just 17 games.

With the two rivals at completely different ends of the table, both, interestingly, face a similar issue, which neither head coach has yet to resolve.

George Hirst and Josh Sargent are misfiring in front of goal for Ipswich Town and Norwich City

Though Ipswich are among the top-scoring sides in the league, they remain some way off runaway leaders Coventry City.

In their promotion campaign of 2023/24, McKenna's side were the top-scorers in the league that season, hitting 92 goals across the Championship season, though no player in the side was their clear goal-getter, with both Conor Chaplin and Nathan Broadhead netting 13 times as the club's top scorers.

This campaign, players simply aren't contributing enough, with Sindre Walle Egeli struggling to adjust to life at the club following his record move from Denmark, and both Chuba Akpom and Ivan Azon are also not hitting the expected heights.

The burden, though, has fallen on George Hirst, who, alongside Norwich's Josh Sargent, is underperforming in front of goal.

According to FotMob, Hirst has an expected goal return of 7.9, whilst Sargent has an expected goals return of 7.5, with the pair having netted just six each.

Hirst has been the man McKenna has relied upon up front this season following the departure of Liam Delap in the summer, whilst Sargent, who has a reputation for scoring plenty at this level, has struggled too.

Sargent hit five in his first four games of the season, but has netted just once in 16 games since, and missed Norwich's recent home win over Southampton, where Jovon Makama deputised up top and netted twice.

Both McKenna and Clement have yet to get the best out of their forwards, albeit Clement has had less time to work with the USMNT forward, but if Ipswich are to seriously challenge for the top two this season and Norwich are to escape a relegation battle, both managers must simply find a way to extract more performance from the strikers than what they are currently getting.

Ipswich Town and Norwich City have different ambitions this season, but face the same issue

Heading into this campaign, Ipswich would have been expecting at least a top six finish, with many hoping for a top two finish and some the league title.

Whilst they have so far fallen short of those ambitions, there is still plenty of the season remaining to turn things around at Portman Road, as there is for Clement to turn things around at Carrow Road.

Norwich fell short of their ambitions of the play-offs last season, and following the arrival of Manning and investment into the playing squad, the ambition for a play-off finish was there again, but they have fallen way short of the mark.

Now, Clement's main goal will be to rescue the Canaries from a relegation scrap, and getting the best out of Sargent, who has seen himself linked with clubs in the Premier League as of late, is absolutely imperative to those ambitions.

In Suffolk, with Azon failing to hit the target consistently since his loan switch from Como, Hirst will likely continue to be McKenna's main man up top, but he simply must start hitting the back of the net on a more consistent basis if Ipswich truly are to hit their pre-season ambitions.